Thomas whirled on her, his broken softness for Andrew suddenly packed up. Now he was all feral wolf with a mouthful of broken glass. “Shut the hell up, Lana. Do you ever ask for two sides of a story? Or is the whole point to hate me as much as you can?”
Sparks snapped in Lana’s eyes. “Excuse me for trying to step in before you hurt another Perrault.”
Thomas shoved to his feet and slammed both fists so hard on the table that their plates jumped. “I did not HURT DOVE.”
Heads had swiveled their way. Interest piqued. Dinner made more interesting by a fresh, juicy drama. It would bring a teacher and detention slips soon, but Thomas and Lana didn’t seem to care.
“Um, should you lower your voices?” Chloe said meekly.
“You left her.” Lana rose from her seat, too, and Chloe shrank. “It’s your fault—”
“I did nothing to her!” Thomas was halfway to yelling. “You have no idea what happened.”
“You’re such a manipulative liar,” Lana hissed. “And a bully. And a—”
“Stop,” Andrew said, but he was too quiet to be heard.
“—amonster.” Lana spat the word.
“Yeah, maybe I am.” Thomas’s voice went deathly cold. “Maybe I’m to blame for everything that’s gone wrong at this school. Will that satisfy you?”
Lana laughed, but it was a harsh sound. She looked about to cry. “Oh, go to hell, Thomas Rye. Murderer.”
He shoved away from the table and Andrew lunged for him. He caught Thomas’s wrist and twisted it hard enough for him to cry out. A teacher stormed toward them, but the entire world had been eclipsed except for Thomas.
Thomas.
Thomas.
In pain, hurt, falling apart.
Lana’s level of vitriol didn’t even make sense. Maybe Thomas broke Dove’s heart, but Dove didn’t have to ice them all out over it. They could make up. Andrew could still make her listen.
“Don’t talk to him like that,” he said to Lana. “I can fix it with Dove.”
She stared at him.
Whatever. He knew Dove best, not her.
Right now all he could do was tug Thomas into him so their bodies collided and their anger pooled in each other’s heaving lungs.
Andrew took Thomas’s face and turned it toward him, his heart ripping in half when he met Thomas’s eyes. Green and glossy, a forest in a storm. He was furiously trying to hide how close he was to tears.
Andrew tried to say,It’s okay.
But someone screamed.
They whirled around at the same time, the very moment a monster pulled out of the wallpaper.
A boy crept softly through the forest, looking for a white stag that legend said could grant three wishes. From his back grew gossamer moth wings that dragged on the ground and tore at a touch, and words had been cut into his skin that wept indigo blood. A wish would cure him of these peculiar miseries.
But he grew tired as he searched, and his feet bled and his tears left tracks of salt down his weary cheeks. He did not find the stag.
He did find a fairy prince, though, with a sharp smile and roses blooming from his wrists.
“You should come with me,” the boy said. “A wish from the white stag will fix me and it could fix you, too.”
The fairy prince looked at him quizzically. He bit a rosebud off his wrist and twirled it before handing it to the boy with a shy smile.
